Coming Back to You
by Oomaki-chan
Summary: Adrien's plans fall flat after running away from home. Thankfully, an unexpected savior lets him crash at her place for a little while. He had only planned on being gone for a few days, but now he's getting too used to her presence in his every day life.
1. Chapter 1

Waking up before the sun was even out should have been the first clue that this was a bad idea. Transforming into Chat Noir to jump out the window with a duffle bag in one hand and his school bag in the other should have been the second clue. Once reaching the school, Adrien made sure to ditch his superhero alter ego before going up the stairs to the main entrance.

It was six in the morning. He was a whole two and a half hours early, trying to make sure that he was up and out of the house before his Father or Nathalie would have been able to stop him. The main door into the courtyard was still open,so he walked right in. It seemed odd, walking around with all the lights out and no one else there. Normally when he arrived at school, he would be greeted by his friends. He would see large groups of people making plans for when the day was over. Some kids would be scrambling to copy down the answers for the homework they forgot to do. Instead, the courtyard was dark and empty and silent.

Adrien walked across to the door where everyone's lockers were. Unfortunately, that door was actually locked. " _Merde_."

"Watch your language so early in the morning." Plagg lazily floated around Adrien's head before sitting on his shoulder.

"Sorry." The teenager let out a sigh, leaning his back against the brick wall by the door, and letting himself slip down until he was seated on the ground. He pulled his school bag into his lap, opening it up and pulling out a paper bag and a circular box that his kwami recognized immediately. He set the box of camembert on the ground and watched Plagg rush to it. Then Adrien opened up the paper bag and took out the food inside. Before leaving he had made sure to pack himself something for breakfast; A bagel with cream cheese and smoked salmon, a chocolate croissant, a bottle of orange juice, and a thermos with his favorite kind of coffee. Sure, it was just a bunch of carbs, but it was good. "This is a dumb idea, isn't it?"

"It's only dumb because you don't have place to stay." Plagg said through mouthfulls of cheese.

"I'm going to stay at Nino's."

Adrien would have said more, but the main door opened up and one of the teachers, whom he recognized for teaching the higher level courses, walked in. The man stared at Adrien as the boy stood up from his seat on the ground, shaking off the dirt.

"I got here early to work on an assignment." The blonde lied. The teacher seemed to accept this, and disappeared at the top of the metal stairs, only to later return with a ring of keys. Adrien said a quick "thank you" when the teacher unlocked to door to the lockers. Once inside the room, he rushed to his locker and made room for the duffle bag he had brought. It took a bit of pushing to get it inside the locker, and then even more moving around to make it look like it was supposed to be there. By the time he had finished getting settled in, the early birds began to make their way into the school. Max was one of the first to show up, and he honestly looked surprised that Adrien was even there, but he didn't ask any questions.

As more people started arriving, Adrien began feeling more confident in his plan. All he needed was to go through the day like normal. On break he would go back to Nino's house and take his bags with him, and if anyone asked then all he had to do was say he was spending the night. It was easy. "Nothing could possibly go wrong." He muttered to himself.

"What are you saying over there?" A hand slapped the back of Adrien's shoulder, which freaked the teen out until he turned and saw that the very friend he had just been thinking about was behind him. Nino looked way too energetic for the morning, but that might be the lack of sleep talking. "You good for tonight?" Nino whispered.

"Yeah." Adrien smiled. "Thanks again for this man."

"Don't worry about it." The two walked over to Nino's locker. "What are friends for?"

"Right."

"But I'm not sure how long you can stay at my place for. My parents are going to get weird about it eventually." The tanned teen grabbed hold of everything he would need for the morning classes.

"That's fine." Adrien said. "It's just until I figure something else out anyways."

"It's so cool that you're actually doing this!"

"Cool isn't exactly the word I would use…." The pair walked into their classroom, which was starting to fill up.

"Oh come on man!" Nino threw his backpack on top of his portion of their shared desk, and pulled his chair out before sitting down. "You're taking your life into your own hands, that's pretty cool."

"I guess?" Adrien sat down in his own seat, hanging the strap of his shoulder bag on the back of his chair. He open up his bag and started to pull out what he needed for his first class.

The day was very nerve wracking. It felt like any minute someone from his father's company might call him or the school. He also made sure to be extremely careful whenever he opened his locker during breaks. There was no way he was going to let himself get caught, not on the first day at least. Maybe if it was a week in or so, but he hadn't even gotten the chance to take his stuff to Nino's yet. There was no way he was going to-

"What's with the bag?"

 _Zut._

Adrien turned around and saw Alya, standing directly behind him, peeking over his shoulder. A few steps behind her, and looking as though she was trying to keep her distance, was Marinette. Immediately Adrien shut his locker door. "Nothing. Nothing is with the bag."

The first of the girl's threw on a skeptical face, her eyes squinting behind her glasses. "Oh really now?"

"Yes, really." The blonde teen tried his best to act calm. He looked around for possible things to help him. Nino wasn't around to take control of Alya, and it's not like he had other friends to help him out…. For a split second, he made eye contact with Marinette, who immediately looked down at the floor. "You believe, don't you?" He asked the pigtailed girl.

Adrien didn't know Marinette too well, but he knew her enough to know that she honest and easy to put your trust in. "U-um." Adrien watched as Marinette immediately straightened her back, her arms and legs going stiff. "Well, I totally belieb- I mean, believe you, because if you say so then you're probably telling the truth. I mean, you don't really have a reason to lie."

When Marinette finished stumbling over her words, Adrien just smiled his thanks. She was a nice girl, and he felt a little bad deceiving here, but he didn't exactly have a choice this time around. He closed his locker, and spun the dial of the lock.

* * *

As much as he hated to say it, Adrien was a runaway. He'd been contemplating it every since his father became the uncaring man he is now. Of course, he never thought he would actually go through with it. Adrien had put up with a lot when it came to his father's overprotective nature, but so many little improvements had been made that it seemed as though everything could work out in the end. Now he was able attend an actual school like a normal human being, hang out with other people his age, and his life as Chat Noir gave him the freedom to see every possible inch of Paris. It should have been the dream.

Unfortunately enough, the dream didn't last. His father got more and more distant as the days went by. Adrien quickly became desperate. He didn't plan on being gone long; maybe a week or so. He just wanted to be gone long enough to cause a little worry, nothing major, and it wasn't like he was going to completely flake on his responsibilities. It wouldn't be hard to keep going to school, especially with Nino helping him out.

But, of course, every plan always seemed to fall apart.

" _Go home_ , she said. _It's not right to sneak out like this_ , she said. _It can't be all that bad,_ she said." Adrien kicked a rock on the sidewalk. His hands were shoved into his pockets, with his school bag on one shoulder and his duffel on the other. It was already past ten o'clock, and he had been ready to spend the night, but the second Nino's parents overheard them talking about how Adrien wasn't planning on returning home, they sent him away in hopes that he would just go right back.

"Oh calm down." Plagg sighed. "Let's just go back then! We can go get more camembert, play video games, not sleep in the streets…"

"You don't get it Plagg. I wanted to prove a point here." Adrien tried to explain it to his predicament to his kwami for the umpteenth time. It wasn't news that human problems didn't seem to bother the floating black cat…bug…ghost...thing… That didn't mean that Adrien wasn't tired of all this. Especially now that his entire scheme had fallen through. He didn't want to go back home now, but he just didn't know what else to do. He didn't have any other close friends, especially not any who would put up with him and risk cops knocking at their door.

Adrien found himself walking into the park near his school. He walked around the fountain in the center a few times before deciding to sit on one of the benches until he could think over his next move. The blonde boy leaned back against the wood of the bench, lifting his arms up to stretch them above his head. He sat for a few moments, looking up at the sky just in time to see the lights of an airplane that was flying however many thousand feet overhead. "This sucks." He muttered. "Maybe I should just transform or something."

"What good would that do you?" Plagg was fiddling with the zippers of the dufflebag.

"I don't know. But Ladybug is on patrol tonight, so maybe I could find her and think of something?" It wasn't necessarily a bad idea. She might know a place he could go for a little while. Even if he didn't find her, swinging around the city late at night was a good way to cool his head after all this. Adrien rubbed his fingers over his ring, twisting it back and forth around the digit. The question of whether or not he should transform strung itself up in his head, and he wasn't too sure how to answer it still. " _To be or not to be_ \- I guess."

Who knows how long it was before Adrien finally made his decision. If he couldn't find a place to sleep as Adrien, then he could at least find a nice rooftop somewhere to crash for the night until he could rethink the whole situation. He stood up from the bench, holding a closed fist in front of his chest. "Plagg! Transf-"

A large clanging became the loudest sound in the park, breaking through the usual Paris background noise. It wasn't just one sound, rather, several noises strung together in what sounded like the crash track of an old sit-com tv show. Adriene was surprised that it didn't end with the sound of a car horn and a screeching cat. The teen looked around for the source of the noise. Behind a hedge he saw the silhouette of a figure over a pile of garbage. His eyes widened when he was able to see in the street light's glow just enough to make out one of his classmates, specifically Marinette, the girl who sat behind him. He watched as she frantically tried to pick up a fallen trashcan, setting it upright once more, then looking at the pieces of trash that had fallen out of it. As Adrien walked closer, he could see the worried expression on her face. She clearly didn't know what to do with the trash. While it was funny to watch, the girl clearly needed help.

"Marinette?" He voiced, walking closer to her.

The pigtailed girl looked as though she had lept out of her own skin. She stumbled and barely saved herself from tripping on air. His classmate whirled around to see who had called her name out so late at night. "Who's there?"

"It's just me. Adrien." He stepped into the light, letting himself be seen, hands open in front of his chest to show that he came in peace. He watched as the girl's face went through several phase changes. At first she had looked so concerned about the figure that came out of the darkness of the park, then her eyes grew large, eyebrows shooting up her forehead, her mouth opening and closing rapidly as she looked for words.

Marinette was always an odd one. She didn't speak too much to anyone other than her best friend Ayla, but that didn't mean she didn't have any friends. From what Adrien could tell, she was in the good graces of everyone in their class; except for Chloe. Those two always seemed to have a bone to pick with each other. Marinette didn't talk too much to Adrien though. He figured it was just because she was pretty shy. It wasn't uncommon for her to stutter over her words, just like now. It looked like words were running through her mind at a mile a minute, but none of them seemed to be able to form into actual sounds. Adrien waited patiently none-the-less. He looked at the pile of trash on the ground, noticing a soda can by his feet. He picked it up, and went to put it in the bin.

"Wh-why are- oh. Thank you." Marinette said as her classmate picked up some of less disgusting looking trash. "I mean…. Wh-why a-are you here A-Adri-Adrien?"

Adrien offered the pigtailed girl a smile in hopes that being friendly would help her calm down. "I just kind of… ended up here." He picked up another few pieces of trash, noticing that the girl across from him did as well, and wiped his hands off on his pants. "I could be asking you the same thing though."

"I, um, I went for a stroll, er.. Walk. Yeah, 'cause, you know.. I live- my house is- my famil- I live nearby." A red tint ghosted over Marinette's cheeks as she spoke. She nervously picked at the hem of her shirt. It was then that Adrien took note of the relaxed clothing she was in. While he was still in the clothes he had worn to school, Marinette wore a pair of gray and white polka dot shorts, with a pink sweatshirt over what looked like a tank top. It was clearly her pajamas. Why she was walking around in the middle of the night in that was beyond Adrien's comprehension.

"I guess I was almost doing the same."

There was a moment of silence between them. Adrien scratched at the back of his neck. He didn't know what to say. Thankfully enough, he didn't have to speak first.

"Weren't… Weren't you s-sup-posed to go to Nino's?" Marinette asked. Her blue eyes flicked from her shoes, to Adrien's face at record speed.

"Yeah. I was supposed to." The sigh he let out was unintentional. He didn't necessarily was to bring attention to his current predicament. He didn't want to involve someone like Marinette, who was so far removed from the whole situation. At the same time… Here was an opportunity to talk to someone other than his lazy kwami, and he trusted her enough not to talk about it to anyone else. "Hey…. Do you want to come sit with me for a bit?"

* * *

"Thank you." Marinette said as a water bottle was handed to her. This was definitely not how she expected this night to go. It had just been another night of patrolling her favorite city, swinging from rooftops with her yo-yo as Ladybug. Thankfully, it had been a quiet night as far as akuma attacks went. As it got late, she decided to turn in for the night. Normally she would have just gone straight to the terrace on the roof of her home, but since it had been a nice enough night, she decided to land in the park for once. She most definitely did not expect to run into Adrien there.

Adrien. Of all the people, it had to be Adrien. It couldn't have been Ayla? It couldn't have been that lovely old lady who stopped by the bakery each morning? No. It had to be the guy she had a crush on who found her tripping over trashcans in the middle of the night.

She looked down at the water bottle in her hands, and twisted the cap open. It wasn't cold, but it still felt good to drink something. Her Ladybug suit didn't exactly have room for refreshments.

"It's a nice night." Adrien's voice broke the silence.

All Marinette was able to do was nod at first. Her elbows were clenched into her sides. "Um…. So…." She didn't even know where to start. It had sounded like the beautiful blonde next to her wanted to talk about something, but how do you even bring up sensitive subjects without sounding nosy or rude?

"Right. Nino." Thankfully, Adrien brought it up again of his own accord. He began explaining the situation. There weren't a whole lot of details mentioned. He talked about how he needed space from his home life, and how he had felt like it was suffocating him . Apparently he had planned on spending a few nights at Nino's just to get away. It sounded like it should have been a good plan. "His mother found out why I was over though, and she told me to go home." Adrien continued. "I've been sitting here trying to figure out if I should just go back or not."

"Where…. um…. " Marinette tried to figure out how to say what she wanted to say, but still sound sympathetic. This was a situation she thankfully was not familiar with. She'd never wanted to run away from home before. Her family had always been so good to her and understanding, that there was never the need to even think about the act. "Where would y-you sl-sleep? If-if you don't, don't go home I mean."

"Ah…. That's the question isn't it?" The laugh that the boy let out was like a breath of fresh air. His eyes squinted as the corners of his mouth curled into a slight smile.

Despite the smile on Adrien's face, a frown formed on Marinette's. That wasn't good. Was he just planning on sleeping on this bench or something? That wasn't good at all. She knew very well how smart this boy was. How could he possibly consider sleeping outside in the middle of Paris? Granted, he may not have been aware of how dangerous this city could get, but Marinette knew first hand how this city got when the sun went down.

Now, maybe it was thinking about Adrien sleeping, cold and alone on a park bench, or maybe it was just her good nature that spoke for her. Her words came out of nowhere, and for once, they were perfectly clear.

"Want to stay at my place?"


	2. Chapter 2

The silence was nearly unbearable, but Adrien didn't exactly know what to say, so he let the silence stay. He walked next to Marinette, that girl who sat behind him in class, with his duffle bag slung over his shoulder. They walked next to eat other. Marinette lead the way to her place, the little bakery that was just across the street from their school.

The surprise of Marinette offering up her place for the night still hadn't quite settled in. From what Adrien knew of this girl, which albeit wasn't a whole lot, she was pretty shy and pretty clumsy, and a fairly reserved. He definitely would not have expected her to invite a guy into her home this late at night. Sure, Adrien was a classmate, so it wasn't too weird, but they weren't exactly close friends. Their best friend's were dating, so they hung out a few times as a result. That was as far as their relationship had gone though. Of course, Adrien hoped that they could become good friends. Marinette was a really nice girl.

It wasn't more than a five minutes of walking before the pair stood outside of the bakery. There was only one problem at this point; getting Adrien inside without her parents noticing. It was late, and chances are they were both asleep, but Marinette made it clear that she didn't want to risk walking through the front door, and marching right up to her room, with a teenage boy following behind her.

Adrien remembered the last, and only time he had been over at Marinette's. It was to practice playing video games before that tournament a while back. He met her parent's then, and while they were very hospitable, and seemed like really good people, they checked in on the two quite often. It made sense that they wouldn't exactly be too happy having a guy sneak into their beloved daughter's room in the middle of the night. Plus her father was a really big guy. Adrien did _not_ want to get on his bad side.

The blonde teen turned to face the girl standing next to him. She looked towards the buildings around them, specifically the one that shared a wall with her family's bakery and home. Her eyes focused in on the fire escape hanging on the wall of her neighbors. "Um… How…. How good are you at climbing ladders?" Marinette must have seen the puzzled expression on Adrien's face. "There's a l-lad-ladder next door that goes to the roof, a-and fr-from there you can, um, you can get to the balcony, well, terrace...thing…on my house…" Her face still had its regular pink coloring.

Adrien's mouth formed an 'oh' as he realized the plan. "I'm pretty good at climbing." He smiled.

Marinette let out a shaking sigh, perhaps out of relief. Her plan would probably work. She led Adrien to the fire escape. The boy grabbed hold of one of the metal bars, and pulled himself up high enough to get his feet on the lowest bar. He looked up the stone wall and ladder, then back down at Marinette. "Looks good to me."

Marinette's gaze shifted down to her own feet. She kicked at the sidewalk a few times, then suddenly, in almost a scramble, she grabbed the handle of the duffle bag Adrien was carrying. "I-I'll take this and go m-make sure the unlocked is balcony. I mean! The balcony is unlocked! The door, th-the door on the balcony, th-that goes to my room. I-I'll go unlock it."

Adrien watched pigtails bounce as his classmate ran off and disappeared inside the bakery. "Well, that's that then." He began climbing the ladder, as he did, Plagg floated out from inside his shirt.

"Sure, make you climb while she takes the stairs." Th kwami lazily lingered in the air around Adrien's shoulders.

"Don't be rude Plagg." Adrien said as he reached to pull himself up to the next bar. It didn't take him all the long to get to the top of the building, he thanked his inner cat for that one. Being a superhero certainly did pay off when it came to physical abilities. When he finally did make it to the top, he swung his leg over the slight wall, until he stood fully on the roof top. "Marinette is really helping us out here. She didn't need to offer her place to us."

"And you didn't need to run away."

" _Tais-toi."_ Adrien shot an angry glare at the small, black kwami. Plagg knew very well why Adrien left home. He had helped make the final decision.

Adrien forced the creature's words out of his mind and focused on walking across the roof. There was a small space, only about two feet wide, that connected where he currently was to the corner apartment. "I can do this. It's not like I don't climb Notre Dame or jump off le Tour d'Eiffel all the time." The teenaged model talked himself through it as he crossed the small space. He avoided looking down at the ground, which was a solid three stories down from him. This would have been a no-brainer as Chat Noir. He would have backflipped over to the terrace in his alternate form, not even thinking about falling because he would catch himself with his staff before making contact with the ground. But right now he wasn't Chat, he was Adrien, and that certainly changed a lot. If he fell now, he was screwed.

Thankfully enough, the blonde had very good balance. He crossed it without a hitch, then climbed a small three foot wall, and landed right on the terrace. It felt good to have railings to keep him from falling. Adrien tried the little trap door that lead would lead inside, but it was locked. So, he stopped and took a moment to look around.

This was a new view for Adrien. He had thought that he had seen every sight this city had to offer. Whether it was the view from the top of a national landmark, or something as simple as a flower growing through the cracks of the sidewalk. Paris was a beautiful place. Still, Adrien had never seen it from this spot before. From the front of the balcony, he could see the Seine, which reflected the lights from the street lamps. If he looked to the side, he could see into the park that he had just been sitting in, and if he looked up, he was able to see overtop all the neighboring buildings, and see the Parisian landscape stretch for miles. It was rather breathtaking. For a moment, he was a little jealous that Marinette had something this nice to look at each day, but then he remembered that he often took cat naps on top of the Arc de Triomphe.

The sound of the hatch opening up was what made Adrien turn around. He made brief eye contact with Marinette, before the girl looked away. "Y-you made it."

A smile grew across Adrien's face. "Did you think I wouldn't?"

Marinette just shook her head. "C-c-come, come on i-in."

Adrien took the invitation quickly. The second Marinette was out of the way, he was climbing through the hole and into the building. The second he was inside he noticed that he was directly inside Marinette's bedroom. The door opened up right over her bed, which was lofted over a much larger room space. "Oh. Sorry." He apologized when he realized he had stepped right onto his friend's comforter with his shoes. He immediately climbed down the loft ladder. It felt a little awkward standing right over her bed.

Just like the last time he had been there, the walls were very pink. The furniture matched the pink, white, and black color scheme. Several desks were arranged under the loft, one looked like it was set up for school work, while the others were covered in a chaos of crafting supplies and pieces of fabric. The rest of the room was rather empty in comparison. The only other pieces of furniture were a set of drawers, with mirror, and a light pink, polkadotted chaise. From looking around the girl's room, you could find some of the most important things about her; she loved sewing, and polkadots were her favorite accents.

"M-make yourself comfortable?" Marinette said. Her voice was low and almost inaudible. It was then that Adrien remembered the dangers of waking up her parents.

"Thank you." He replied. His voice was barely above a whisper. Over by the chaise was his duffle bag. He walked over to it, sitting down on the chaise and pulling the bag closer to him. The nervousness inside of him started to rear it's ugly head. He found himself bouncing his knee up and down and drumming his fingers against his thighs rapidly. Drumming turned into rubbing sweaty palms on the denim of his jeans. "Is it ok if I sleep here?" He asked. Mostly he was just asking to break the awkward silence.

"Wh-where? Oh… There." The blue-black haired girl pulled at one of her pigtails, then brushed some of the hair out of her face. Her eyes kept looking everywhere but the boy in her room. "That's fine. I'll…. I'll go find a blanket…"

Adrien watched the girl scurry down the hatch in her floor to the living area of the apartment. While she was gone, Adrien just sat in silence. Plagg flew out from his shirt pocket and disappeared into his duffle bag for the night. It wasn't too long before Marinette came back into her room carrying a folded up blanket, with a pillow stacked on top. She placed it down on the cushion next to the blonde boy. "Do…. do you thi-think that'll be ok?"

"Of course it will be." Adrien gave his classmate the most sincere smile he could. Anything to make the situation less awkward and nerve wracking for her. "I really can't thank you enough for this Marinette."

There was a small pause as his classmate just stared at him, then at the floorboards they stood on, then back up at him. "You're welcome." The silence grew between them once more. "We… We should go to bed."

"Right. Yeah it is really late isn't it?" Marinette just nodded in response before turning to walk towards the ladder to the loft her bed was on.

"Um…. G-g-good n-night." The girl's voice came out as a squeak before she scurried up the ladder. There must have been a light switch up there, because the lights in the room soon flicked off. In the darkness of the room, Adrien managed to lay down on the cushioned furniture, and cover himself with the provided blanket. It was quite comfortable actually, even though it was nowhere near the size of his bed at home.

"Good night." He said just loud enough that Marinette should have been able to hear him.


	3. Chapter 3

Adrien woke up to the feeling of his cell phone vibrating under under an unfamiliar pillow. It wasn't his usual alarm, or set time to wake up. Infact, this was almost an hour earlier than he would normally wake up. He sat up, blinking the sleep out of his eyes and letting his vision adjust to seeing once more. When his eyelids decided to stop being so heavy, he was able to see his surroundings more. All around him were barely familiar pink walls and furniture. The teen removed his blanket and noticed that he was wearing the same clothes he had fallen asleep in. Within moments, Adrien began to remember what had happened the night before. His running away, and how he ended up in Marinette's bedroom.

He didn't know when Marinette would wake up, but judging by her track record of running late for class, Adrien had a feeling that he had plenty of time to get dressed. He reached into his duffle bag, which was on the floor next to the chaise he had slept on, and pulled out fresh clothing for the day. Seeing as it was his safest bet, he ducked under the loft to where the desks were, and very quickly ditched his old, dirty covered clothes, for the fresh ones. He then gathered his school supplies in his usual satchel. The real issue out be getting out. From what he noticed, the only way onto that rooftop terrace was the hatch above Marinette's. Adrien looked around at the windows in the room. That would work.

Before leaving, he wrote a note and left it on top of the dresser. Once again, he thanked his ability to transform into Chat Noir so that his brilliant escape plan would work. He swung around rooftops to a small cafe he knew opened early in the morning, just a half-mile away from Marinette's. He had stopped by it many times on his way to different photoshoots, but he'd never gone as Chat Noir. This was going to the quite the surprise for whoever had opened up shop today.

* * *

Sitting in class so early was an interesting event. Since he had gotten there so early, Adrien watched everyone walk in at different times. He had never known how early, or late, each of his classmates got to school. Normally, even when he had gotten to school relatively early, he and Nino would stand in the courtyard until the first bell rang. But Adrien didn't want to just awkwardly wait alone until his best friend showed up.

Max was the first to wander into the class. Others soon followed behind though. Nino walked in around the usual time and immediately slid into his seat. "Yo dude." He kept his voice at a whisper. "What ended up happening last night? You ok?"

"Yeah. I, uh." Adrien stopped himself before saying too much. "I found a place to crash last night."

"I guess that's good." Nino tapped his hand against the desk in a slight rhythm. "Are you going to go back home tonight or no?"

"I don't know yet." Adrien whispered.

"I guess it depends on if you can stay where you did last night again, huh?"

That thought had hit Adrien already. He couldn't intrude on Marinette again. She was nice enough to let him stay over once. They weren't any more than just classmates. She didn't even need to let him stay the first time around, let alone another night. That was too much to ask for.

Speak of the devil, the exact pig-tailed girl he had been thinking about walked in, Ayla at her side. The two girls were laughing about something when they walked into the room, but they were too far into the conversation to figure out what exactly it was they were talking about. There was a brief moment where Adrien could have sworn he made eye contact with Marinette, but neither said anything about the matter.

Class went on as usual. Thankfully enough, no one seemed suspicious of Adrien for any reason. It was very nerve wracking, knowing you were trying to keep such a big secret, and that you could get caught at any moment. But, he had done a good job of making himself as normal as possible. He had all of his homework done, he was well rested, and was acting the same as he always did. Keeping his running away secret would depend on his own ability to stay tight lipped, a lot of trust in Marinette, and prayers that his father wouldn't contact the school.

As the morning classes went on, and none of the teachers brought up needing to speak with him about anything, Adrien was finally able to let out a stiff breath he had been holding. It wasn't until lunch break, when he felt a tap on the back of his shoulder, that his chest constricted once more.

"H-hey." Marinette said, her usual flustered expression on her face. "Um…. You…. You said you found a guide stud- er…. Study guide for physics in the library right? Could you show it to me?"

Adrien knew very well that he had never mentioned any such study guide, but it didn't take a genius to figure out that this was Marinette's best attempt at discretely saying she wanted to talk to him. "Sure. I've got time to show you now if you want." Adrien watched as the small girl just nodded her head, grabbing hold of her backpack, and swinging it over her shoulders. With as calm of a smile as he could muster, Adrien said a brief nothing to dismiss himself from Nino, and grabbed him own bag, before beginning to leave the classroom with Marinette at his heels.

It was an awkward walk to the library. Neither of the two teens said anything to each other, or even looked at each other for that matter. Thankfully, there were never many people in the library during lunch break, so it wasn't hard to find a nice, secluded corner, hidden among the bookshelves. But when they did stop, both teens just awkwardly leaned against the stacks. Adrien didn't know what to say, or what he needed to say. He wasn't the one who ended up breaking the silence though.

"You left early." Marinette was looking down at her feet. "I saw your note though."

"Oh. Yeah." Adrien lifted a hand to scratch nervously at the back of his neck. "Thanks again for last night. You really saved me there Marinette."

"No, no. Happy to help." The girl waved two hands in front of her chest with a little frantic nervousness. The air around the two teens very quickly went still again though. "I am curious though…. How did you get out this morning?"

Adrien froze. He hadn't even thought of how to explain it. In the early morning hours, he had just transformed right into Chat Noir without even thinking about how Adrien would have been able to leave. "I-uh…. I kind of just uh…. I tiptoed through your apartment." He began lying through his teeth. "I was careful to make sure I didn't run into either of your parents and left through the apartment door, not the bakery…." There was a moment where Adrien just silently begged that Marinette wouldn't be able to pick up on his lie.

"Next time, do you think you could just wait until I wake up, and leave through the terrace?" Marinette said. "I don't want to risk you running into my parents."

"Wait…. Next time?" Adrien wasn't quite sure he had heard the girl right.

"Well… Unless you have another place to stay…." The bluenette's face was bright red as she stared down at her pink sneakers, which suddenly had a lot of interest in the libraries wood floor. "Y-you don't h-h-have to stay with me….. If you don't want to I mean I would understand it is kindofweirdtostaywithagirlinyourclas-"

"Marinette!" Adrien stopped her rambling with two hands clamping down on her shoulders. He couldn't stop the smile the appeared on his face. His gaze was met with two, very surprised, blue eyes, and a shut mouth. "I do need a place to stay again tonight," He began. "But I don't want to trouble you. I can go somewhere else, easy."

Marinette looked to the side for a moment, before making eye contact with the boy in front of her. "If you could go somewhere else, you would have gone there last night. Don't lie to me. If you need my help, just say it."

Adrien was honestly taken aback by Marinette's forwardness. He couldn't get a wrap on this girl. In just moments, she went from stuttering and rambling, to calm and collected. Interesting.

"Just climb up onto my terrace like you did yesterday. I'll leave the window unlocked so you can get in."

"Marinette, you really are a lifesaver, you know that?"

Marinette shook her head. "You don't need to thank me. Just don't get caught."


End file.
